Founders As Martyrs
The founder’s journey is unquestionably challenging. In my book, The Founder’s Manual, I reference it as the hardest professional challenge anyone can take on. That said, founders don’t use it as an excuse to be martyrs.
Founders who post about how no one believes in them, their idea, or their product are not helping themselves or their fledgling company. Don’t get me wrong, it is good to share the ups and downs of entrepreneurship and not keep it bottled up because the emotional roller coaster can take its toll even in the best circumstances. Being a founder can be lonely, and sharing it can make it less so. There is a proper balance to strike between sharing the journey and becoming a martyr, however. Sharing can be helpful and therapeutic while being a martyr is destructive.
Martyrdom is a place many founders want to go early on when most people are going to think they are crazy, but staying there becomes unproductive. Being a martyr almost always ensures the continuation of being a martyr because people aren’t going to flock to someone repeatedly spouting off about how it’s them versus the world and how they are misunderstood. Founders who continue a narrative that no one gets them or their idea/product push people away who otherwise might be willing to engage and support them in some way. If “You just don’t get it” becomes a regular statement from a founder, the other people probably aren’t the problem.
Being a martyr takes its toll on the founder. The constant drum beat of woe is me, and it’s me against the world begets more negativity. Self-talk is more critical for founders than most people because of the mountain that must be climbed in the best circumstances. A founder who is a martyr makes the climb and the associated mental, physical, and emotional anguish exponentially more difficult. A founder, being a martyr, will be more likely to make emotionally charged and impulsive decisions.
To be sure, founders need thick skin. They are often going to be disbelieved before being believed. Still, a self-aware founder can tell the difference between proving people wrong and being in denial about the veracity of what they are working on. No one has to like or believe in what you are doing. You have to earn the right for them to believe. Belief is not given; it is earned. People don’t believe? Don’t shit post about them not believing. Earn their belief. There will be stories of success in which a founder shares that no one believed in what they were doing until they did. The part of these stories that founders who have become martyrs focus on is that no one believed in what the other founder was doing. The part of the story to focus on is that the founder who ultimately achieved success did so by ignoring the naysayers and pushing forward. In doing so, these founders never became martyrs because becoming one would have most likely prevented their eventual success.
Being a martyr causes a founder to be defiant, but being defiant isn’t the objective and detracts founders from being focused on the most important things. Founders can prevent themselves from becoming martyrs by focusing their interactions with customers, especially before customer product fit. Conversations with anyone except customers early on are more likely to be with people who need help understanding what a founder is trying to do and why. For founders, the only negative feedback that matters is from customers. A customer’s disbelief or lack of understanding must be validated, addressed, and overcome.
So, founders, the next time you start to think, speak, and act like a martyr, stop yourself and get back to the important work of focusing on the problem, customers, and how you are going to help them solve it. Everything else is noise that isn’t worth getting that worked up or defensive about.
